TY  - JOUR
A1  - Benbow, W.
A1  - Bird, R.
A1  - Brill, A.
A1  - Brose, Robert
A1  - Chromey, A. J.
A1  - Daniel, M. K.
A1  - Feng, Q.
A1  - Finley, J. P.
A1  - Fortson, L.
A1  - Furniss, A.
A1  - Gillanders, G. H.
A1  - Giuri, C.
A1  - Gueta, O.
A1  - Hanna, D.
A1  - Halpern, J. P.
A1  - Hassan, Tarek
A1  - Holder, J.
A1  - Hughes, G.
A1  - Humensky, T. B.
A1  - Joyce, Amy M.
A1  - Kaaret, P.
A1  - Kar, P.
A1  - Kelley-Hoskins, N.
A1  - Kertzman, M.
A1  - Kieda, D.
A1  - Krause, M.
A1  - Lang, M. J.
A1  - Lin, T. T. Y.
A1  - Maier, Gernot
A1  - Matthews, N.
A1  - Moriarty, P.
A1  - Mukherjee, R.
A1  - Nieto, D.
A1  - Nievas-Rosillos, M.
A1  - Ong, R. A.
A1  - Park, N.
A1  - Petrashyk, A.
A1  - Pohl, Martin
A1  - Pueschel, Elisa
A1  - Quinn, John
A1  - Ragan, K.
A1  - Reynolds, P. T.
A1  - Richards, G. T.
A1  - Roache, E.
A1  - Rulten, C.
A1  - Sadeh, Iftach
A1  - Santander, M.
A1  - Sembroski, G. H.
A1  - Shahinyan, K.
A1  - Sushch, Iurii
A1  - Wakely, S. P.
A1  - Wells, R. M.
A1  - Wilcox, P.
A1  - Wilhelm, Alina
A1  - Williams, David A.
A1  - Williamson, T. J.
T1  - Direct measurement of stellar angular diameters by the VERITAS Cherenkov telescopes
JF  - Nature astronomy
N2  - The angular size of a star is a critical factor in determining its basic properties1. Direct measurement of stellar angular diameters is difficult: at interstellar distances stars are generally too small to resolve by any individual imaging telescope. This fundamental limitation can be overcome by studying the diffraction pattern in the shadow cast when an asteroid occults a star2, but only when the photometric uncertainty is smaller than the noise added by atmospheric scintillation3. Atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes used for particle astrophysics observations have not generally been exploited for optical astronomy due to the modest optical quality of the mirror surface. However, their large mirror area makes them well suited for such high-time-resolution precision photometry measurements4. Here we report two occultations of stars observed by the Very Energetic Radiation Imaging Telescope Array System (VERITAS)5 Cherenkov telescopes with millisecond sampling, from which we are able to provide a direct measurement of the occulted stars’ angular diameter at the ≤0.1 mas scale. This is a resolution never achieved before with optical measurements and represents an order of magnitude improvement over the equivalent lunar occultation method6. We compare the resulting stellar radius with empirically derived estimates from temperature and brightness measurements, confirming the latter can be biased for stars with ambiguous stellar classifications.
Y1  - 2019
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-019-0741-z
SN  - 2397-3366
VL  - 3
IS  - 6
SP  - 511
EP  - 516
PB  - Nature Publ. Group
CY  - London
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Archambault, S.
A1  - Arlen, T.
A1  - Aune, T.
A1  - Behera, B.
A1  - Beilicke, M.
A1  - Benbow, W.
A1  - Bird, R.
A1  - Bouvier, A.
A1  - Buckley, J. H.
A1  - Bugaev, V.
A1  - Byrum, K.
A1  - Cesarini, A.
A1  - Ciupik, L.
A1  - Connolly, M. P.
A1  - Cui, W.
A1  - Errando, M.
A1  - Falcone, A.
A1  - Federici, Simone
A1  - Feng, Q.
A1  - Finley, J. P.
A1  - Fortson, L.
A1  - Furniss, A.
A1  - Galante, N.
A1  - Gall, D.
A1  - Gillanders, G. H.
A1  - Griffin, S.
A1  - Grube, J.
A1  - Gyuk, G.
A1  - Hanna, D.
A1  - Holder, J.
A1  - Hughes, G.
A1  - Humensky, T. B.
A1  - Kaaret, P.
A1  - Kertzman, M.
A1  - Khassen, Y.
A1  - Kieda, D.
A1  - Krawczynski, H.
A1  - Krennrich, F.
A1  - Kumar, S.
A1  - Lang, M. J.
A1  - Madhavan, A. S.
A1  - Maier, G.
A1  - Majumdar, P.
A1  - McArthur, S.
A1  - McCann, A.
A1  - Millis, J.
A1  - Moriarty, P.
A1  - Mukherjee, R.
A1  - de Bhroithe, A. O'Faolain
A1  - Ong, R. A.
A1  - Otte, A. N.
A1  - Park, N.
A1  - Perkins, J. S.
A1  - Pohl, Martin
A1  - Popkow, A.
A1  - Prokoph, H.
A1  - Quinn, J.
A1  - Ragan, K.
A1  - Reyes, L. C.
A1  - Reynolds, P. T.
A1  - Richards, G. T.
A1  - Roache, E.
A1  - Saxon, D. B.
A1  - Sembroski, G. H.
A1  - Smith, A. W.
A1  - Staszak, D.
A1  - Telezhinsky, Igor O.
A1  - Theiling, M.
A1  - Varlotta, A.
A1  - Vassiliev, V. V.
A1  - Vincent, S.
A1  - Wakely, S. P.
A1  - Weekes, T. C.
A1  - Weinstein, A.
A1  - Welsing, R.
A1  - Williams, D. A.
A1  - Zitzer, B.
A1  - Boettcher, Markus
A1  - Fegan, S. J.
A1  - Fortin, P.
A1  - Halpern, J. P.
A1  - Kovalev, Y. Y.
A1  - Lister, M. L.
A1  - Liu, J.
A1  - Pushkarev, A. B.
A1  - Smith, P. S.
T1  - Discovery of a new tev Gamma-Ray source - VER J0521+211
JF  - The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics
N2  - We report the detection of a new TeV gamma-ray source, VER J0521+211, based on observations made with the VERITAS imaging atmospheric Cherenkov Telescope Array. These observations were motivated by the discovery of a cluster of >30 GeV photons in the first year of Fermi Large Area Telescope observations. VER J0521+211 is relatively bright at TeV energies, with a mean photon flux of (1.93 +/- 0.13(stat) +/- 0.78(sys)) x 10(-11) cm(-2) s(-1) above 0.2 TeV during the period of the VERITAS observations. The source is strongly variable on a daily timescale across all wavebands, from optical to TeV, with a peak flux corresponding to similar to 0.3 times the steady Crab Nebula flux at TeV energies. Follow-up observations in the optical and X-ray bands classify the newly discovered TeV source as a BL Lac-type blazar with uncertain redshift, although recent measurements suggest z = 0.108. VER J0521+211 exhibits all the defining properties of blazars in radio, optical, X-ray, and gamma-ray wavelengths.
KW  - BL Lacertae objects: individual (VER J0521+211)
KW  - gamma rays: galaxies
Y1  - 2013
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/776/2/69
SN  - 0004-637X
SN  - 1538-4357
VL  - 776
IS  - 2
PB  - IOP Publ. Ltd.
CY  - Bristol
ER  -